Removal of organic and inorganic matters from secondary effluent using resin adsorption and reuse of desorption eluate using ozone oxidation

Abstract This study aimed to compare the effectiveness of MAER and L20 resin for the adsorption treatment of secondary effluent, and evaluate the applicability of ozone oxidation for the reuse of desorption eluate. Bench-scale adsorption experiments showed that the MAER resin exhibited higher efficiency than L20 resin in removal of COD within 600 treated bed volumes (BV), which declined from 32.5% to 14.1% in the first and sixth treatment loading of 100 BV. On the other hand, the L20 resin displayed obviously higher removal efficiency of total nitrogen (TN) than MAER resin within 600 BV, which dropped from 74.6% to 9.8% at the same condition. The ozone oxidation treatment could achieve desirable reuse of desorption eluate, although its chemical oxygen demand (COD) concentration increased gradually in line with the reuse numbers. The uptake of COD, TN and total phosphorus declined steadily by using ozone treated eluate as the regenerant in successive adsorption-desorption cycles, but increased obviously with a new batch of regenerant. Overall, the resin adsorption could efficiently remove organic and inorganic matters from secondary effluent, while the treatment loop including desorption eluate oxidation and eluate reuse could markedly enhance the concentration ratio of treated effluent.